We were playing at Hastings in the Week. “W. G.” was in command. It was my lucky day, having made 50 or so by blind slogging, and the liberal help of a sluggish field. The Doctor suggested you should try the Chapel end. I took 28 off the first three overs, six of them fours, mostly well off the off stump, bouncing up against the canvas at square leg. I remember the aggrieved look on your face as you remarked to the Old Man, “That’s not much of a stroke, Doctor,” and the Doctor answered, “It’s all right if you can do it, Johnny”; and then, Johnny, you were taken off. We were playing at Lord’s, North _v._ South. It was a perfect wicket. I was in need of a few runs to end the season with. Poor Johnny was bowling, and bowling as well as ever, a bit faster on the fast wicket, and going considerably with his arm. “W. G.” had made as good a 130 as he ever made in his life. I went to the wicket, played two, and the leg stump leant wearily back with a ball that pitched on the middle and off—0! The second innings, through the clemency of Ernest Smith, I avoided a pair. I got to the other end and faced Johnny: the same ball, the same languid attitude of the same stump, and the balance was mightily in your favour, Johnny, as it always was. He was a great bowler on his day, a bowler that was never done with, and the void he has left on the cricket field will not be filled for many a day, if ever it be filled at all. The mind of every cricketer naturally associates with the memory of Briggs the names of the other two great left-handers, Peel and Rhodes; and what a wonderfully successful trio they have been, and what an amount of amiable argument has been expended in the vain attempt to decide which is the greatest of the three! I prefer to bracket the three. And as no side is thoroughly equipped for attack without the inclusion of a bowler of this stamp, had the captain of a side the first call on the services of these two, he no doubt would include Peel on a fast wicket, and in the event of the rain falling, would give the preference to Rhodes. The smile on the face of either of them after a goodly shower, and an hour or two’s stickying sun, has struck terror into the heart of many a creditable run-getter.